Samung to Open Official Accessory Store, Starting with Europe Come July

With the Galaxy S4, Samsung announced a host of new accessories for the flagship device, including the S View Cover, which lets you see a portion of your display when the cover is closed, as well as things like the Body Scale and heart rate monitor, which integrate with the new S Health functionality on the device. Despite how much the company hyped all of these accessories during the device's unveiling, they are still really hard to come by. This is especially true in countries not called the United States. In an effort to make Samsung devices and accessories more available, the company announced a partnership with BestBuy earlier this year, which will put Samsung Experience Shops in more than 1,400 retail locations. According to a new report, Samsung is also finally looking into opening - albeit digitally - a store in Europe for consumers to buy accessories from.

According to a new report from ET News, who quotes industry sources, Samsung is planning to open a digital store for accessories sometime soon. The report says it will launch in Europe "around early July", though it will come to other countries soon after that. The store will sell official Samsung accessories, like the S View Cover, as well as accessories made by select third-party companies.

Obviously, Samsung will be doing this to generate more revenue from its accessory lineup, but the company is also looking to gain customer loyalty and make it much easier to buy accessories for its devices. In most places nowadays, you're stuck with buying either from third-party sites online, or from carrier stores. When buying from third parties, consumers are often worried about the accessory being compatible with their device, especially with all the variants and model numbers floating around.

Finally, the report points out that the smartphone accessory market is at around 50 trillion Korean Won, which equals out to $44 billion, so it seems quite obvious why Samsung would want a piece of that market.

Do you think it's a good idea for Samsung to launch an accessory store for its consumers? What would you like to see offered in it? Tell us down in the comments!

I've had an interest in technology my whole life, with Android dominating the last few years. My first Android device was the Motorola Cliq. Since then, I've filtered through countless phones, with my current being a Galaxy Note II, which I love.